become smaller

How much larger your life would be if your self could become smaller in it!"

[G.K. Chesterton]

more outstanding, more praised

"If you want to experience the flow of love as never before, the next time you are in a competitive situation, pray that the others around you will be more outstanding, more praised, and more used of God than yourself." 

[Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines]

carrying on with your conspiracies, filling the room with a sense of unease

If you come to find me affable
Build a replica for me
Would the idea to you be laughable
Of a pale facsimile?

So will you come to burn an effigy?
It should keep the flies away
And when you long to burn this effigy
It should be of the hours that slip away, slip away

It could be you, it could be me
Working the door, drinking for free
Carrying on with your conspiracies
Filling the room with a sense of unease

Fake conversations on a nonexistent telephone
Like the words of a man who's spent a little too much time alone
When one has spent too much time alone

So will you come to burn my effigy?
It should keep the flies away
If you long to burn an effigy
It should be of a man whose has lost his way, slips away

It could be you, it could be me
Working the door, drinking for free
Carrying on with your conspiracies
Filling the room with a sense of unease

Fake conversations on a nonexistent telephone
Like the words of a man who's spent a little too much time alone
When one has spent too much time alone

[Andrew Bird, "Effigy"]

like waifs clustering around a blazing fire

"Like waifs clustered around a blazing fire, we gathered about [the Bible], holding out our hearts to its warmth and light. The blacker the night around us grew, the brighter and truer and more beautiful burned the word of God." 

[Corrie Ten Boom, The Hiding Place]

Christ in the parent, in the child

"Christ incarnated in the parent is the only hope of incarnating Christ in the child..." - Ann Voskamp

what you do with your solitude

"Your religion is what you do with your solitude." 

[William Temple]